Kokoro No Itami Nakunaru Made Zutto
by Hitokiri Gentatsu
Summary: Two weeks after leaving the Ishinishi Kenshin’s life begins to change when he discovers the true meaning of the words he wishes to live by in the new Meiji Era. Newly updated! Final chapter now loaded.
1. Default Chapter

Kokoro No Itami Nakunaru Made Zutto

Kokoro No Itami Nakunaru Made Zutto 

(Until the Pain in Our Hearts Disappears)

Author: Hitokiri Gentatsu

Rating: PG

Summary/Disclaimer: Two weeks after leaving the Ishinishi Kenshin's life begins to change when he discovers the true meaning of the words he wishes to live by in the new Meiji Era. I do not own Rurouni Kenshin. He came from the pen of Nobuhito Watsuki and is owned by Shueisha 'Jump Comics', Fuji Television and others. I am not making money with this story. Enjoy!

**Chapter One**: The Sword that Protects

"These can only be fought with more bloodshed and the cycle never ends…"

Hiko Seijuro

1st OVA

(Dubbed version)

The road before him had the look of one that was well traveled but the lone swordsman that walked it had seen no one for the past several days even though there were footprints and wheel tracks in the soft earth of the road that indicated heavy traffic in the not to distant past.

"For a road so well traveled there certainly aren't a lot of people around," he thought as he followed the path that countless others had taken before him. 

The wind blew through a stand of bamboo, causing the long thin leaves to make a faint rustling sound. The sun was just setting, disappearing into a golden haze that turned the somewhat cloudy sky above a glowing crimson and orange shot through with pink but the swordsman paid no heed to the sky above him, for it would only remind him of painful memories he was trying desperately to forget and of a past life that was better left unspoken. Silent and alone he walked, making no sound, leaving no trace of his passing and all the while searching his soul for the meaning in his life now that his duty was done. Was there nothing left for him to believe in now that the battle was won? Did he have any reason to continue to exist? Yes, there was. One reason and a vow made to a woman who was years dead. He must live for her and for the promise he made her. He felt a pang of regret in his heart at the loss of so many by his own hand but now he must do as he promised and repay those whose lives he took. 

He walked on, heedless of the rapidly developing night around him nor of the need for food and rest that his body was demanding of him. His mind was concentrating on one thing and that was to get as far away from his past life as he could, to be as far away from Kyoto as this road would take him.

"Please let it be far enough away. Let me find a place where I can live in peace. Perhaps then I will be able to learn what kind of a man I truly am. Maybe I will find peace and be able to learn what my life's purpose is now that the war is over, at least for me." 

He stuck his arms into the sleeves of his gi to warm them and walked on for another hour, alone except for his thoughts. The sky darkened above him and the stars appeared one by one, glittering in the sky not realizing the troubles of the world far below them. Small nocturnal animals began to move about not understanding that the country they lived in was in the chaotic throws of war and rebirth. 

The young swordsman grimaced for he had, until of late, been a part of the bloody war that still tore at his land. He had been one of the tools used to free Japan from three hundred years of slavery to a corrupt government. His was the hand that had helped to shape the new era of equality and peace. But for him there seemed to be no hope for peace or equality because his hands helped to shape the new era but his hands had slain many hundreds in order to do so. He looked at those hands but saw only the blood of the hundreds he had killed staining them crimson. He took a cloth from his sleeve and began to wipe his hands clean, even though they were not dirty. No matter where he went or what he did that blood would always separate him from other people. They would see it in his eyes and smell it on his person no matter how much good he did. He could still smell its sickening sweet metallic order even weeks later. He closed his eyes and took deep, even breaths trying to still the still raging hitokiri within his heart.

He made camp a few moments later, sitting before a fire carefully tended so that no smoke gave away his location to any who may have followed seeking revenge. Mechanically, he ate some food from his pack, noting absently that it was time to trade work for some more food. He stared into the fire, his purple eyes lost in the flames, his mind remembering another fire…

*

The buildings around him were all towers of flame and he stood amidst them, sword in hand, blood still running down the blade, muting its normally reflective surface. He could feel the heat from the flames that leapt and danced around him but that didn't matter to him. All that mattered were the enemies the gathered before him. Several of the Shinsengumi blocked his path out of the inferno the alley had become, intent on keeping him within the ring of buildings that were aflame, even if they died themselves. He could hear the sound of screams coming from people all around, some of whom had become trapped inside the burning buildings.

_ _

_"You would kill innocents just to get me? Why?" The cold voice of the Battousai rang clearly above the crackling and hiss of flames. His face under the red hair that blew around him from his high ponytail was set and grim and his eyes burned amber, reflecting the fire that outlined him in glowing red._

_ _

_The Shinsengumi remained silently blocking his way, their faces full of rage and hatred for the one who stood before them. They stood across the alleyway, preventing his escape and even as he asked his questions he heard running footsteps behind him. Turning his head just slightly, without taking his eye off the group in front of him, he saw more of what appeared to be Shinsengumi cutting off his retreat. The smoke blocked him from seeing them clearly but they had to be Shinsengumi behind him. _

_ _

_"So you want to die today..so be it." He waited, not wanting to be the first to attack, his eyes growing colder as all emotion drained from him until only the former hitokiri, not the bodyguard, stood before them. _

_ _

_The Shinsengumi stood unmoving, watching him for several moments then one of them began to move forward and charged, his sword held in the parallel sword stroke, the Hirazuki. In an instant Battousai reacted, moving at those in front of him as those behind him rushed forward to spring their trap. Soon they had surrounded him, trying to force him closer to the burning buildings around him but he would not let them trap him there. He fought his way clear of their trap, slaying them all with lightening fast strokes of his sword, their screams mingling with the crackling of the flames around them. But even as he slew them, they laughed and told him they would soon see him in Hell. _

_ _

_When the battle lust of the Battousai faded to the edges of his mind, Kenshin saw why they had laughed. Burning debris from the buildings blocked his path and the wind was carrying that debris toward him. He squinted through the smoke, seeking a way out but finding all the ways blocked by fire. He looked up and down the alley but everywhere there were flames. He just stood there, frozen in place, watching the burning flames coming ever closer, flames that were going to claim his life… It was the collapse of a building next to him that spurred him into action once again despite the wounds he had taken in the battle._

_ _

_"I have to get out of here. I must live to atone for all the lives I have taken." He sheathed his sword and ran toward the flames hoping to run fast enough to escape the fire before he burned to death._

_*_

_Several hours later he stumbled into camp, his eyes red and throat raw from the smoke, his hair and clothing covered in soot and his right arm bleeding from the burns it sustained while being used to protect his eyes from the fire. He treated the wounds and burns he received, poured water over himself to clean the soot from his body. Then he changed his clothing and went to see Katsura. It was definantly time for him to leave. Some of the men he slew tonight were with the Ishinishi. Someone within the Ishinishi wanted him dead. _

_ _

_He entered the meeting at the back of the room and few people marked his entrance or even looked at him. He sat and leaned against the far wall with his sword propped against his shoulder. His eyes were closed and his head bowed but his senses were on the alert for any sign of trouble. He listened carefully to the plans for attacking the army that had come to try and oust them from Kyoto. Plans were made to for a quick and decisive strike at the army that lay just outside the city and to crush them once and for all. Kenshin privately agreed with this plan but he said nothing. He continued to sit with his head bowed. He offered no advice on the matter nor was he asked for any. That was fine with him for he knew this battle would be his last. Years of killing had taken their toll on his spirit and his mind, which seemed to be divided into two warring factions. If they won the next battle all that would be left was selfish fighting and if they lost…well they would all be killed._

_ _

_The men discussed the options far into the night but finally agreed to attack at dawn. The samurai filed out of the room, talking among themselves of the battle to come but Kenshin merely sat as he head been sitting for the entire meeting, his hair hiding his closed eyes, his manner deceptively lazy as it always was. Soon the only two people in the room were Katsura and himself._

_ _

_"You are still resolved in this matter, Himura?" Katsura's quiet voice broke the silence._

_ _

_"I am. I want to find a path were I can live in peace and help to protect this new era without killing ever again. I cannot do that here." Kenshin placed his sword in front of him and bowed. "Therefore, I come to ask your permission to leave, Katsura-san."_

_ _

_Across the room, Katsura had not moved from where he had been sitting. He looked at the young man before him, whose red hair was spilling across the floor like the blood of the many victims he slew in the name of justice. Kenshin had changed in the last several years. He was less a machine whose only purpose was to slay whomever he was ordered to. Now he seemed to have found a purpose but he was still a man whose very soul was divided. Katsura could see it in his eyes. His true spirit was peaceful but war had warped that once peaceful spirit into that of a ruthless killer. Now the two coexisted in an uneasy truce. Someday one of them would win complete control over his actions and one day he would have to decide which one he truly was. _

_ _

_"Will you be able to find the path you seek? Can your two selves become one? Will time allow the invisible wounds I gave you time to heal or will those wounds eventually kill you? Katsura thought as he watched the young man before him and smiled. "I give my permission."_

_ _

_"Arigato, Katsura-san." Kenshin said softly, rising from the floor and turning to slide the door behind him open._

_ _

_"Himura…Good fortune to you."_

_ _

_Kenshin half turned and gave him a piercing looked. _

_ _

_"There are still traitors within the Ishinishi. Be careful." he said quietly and he left as silently as he had entered._

_ _

_Katsura sat motionless as Kenshin departed. Katsura knew that some others in the clan wanted to eliminate the former hitokiri because they saw him as a threat to them as one who knew too many of their secrets._

_ _

_"I thought that changing his status from prime hitokiri to a bodyguard would protect him from this fate."_

_ _

_But it had not. They still planned to ambush him with the help of the Shinsengumi. Judging from Himura's attitude they had already made one attempt but he had managed to escape them, at least for the moment._

_ _

_"In the heat of battle, however…"_

_ _

_Himura had unknowingly given them both a way out of their situations. If Himura left before the battle or soon after it was over then whose to say he was still alive and Katsura's willingness to let him go would in some small part help him to atone for the unforgivable crime of turning a young boy into a killer._

_ _

_"Find peace Himura and please forgive me."_

__*

And so it was that after the successful conclusion of the First Battle of Toba Fushimi, Himura Kenshin, the famed Hitokiri Battousai, disappeared from the field. No one knew why are where he went except Kogoro Katsura and the swordsmith Arai Shakuu. He disappeared as quietly as he appeared and was never seen again. 

Now two weeks later, Kenshin sat before the fire, staring into its flames and remembering. His mind was full of doubts that he would ever be able to find the path he had spoken of to Katsura and Shakku. 

"Will I be able to survive or even exist in this new era? Can I learn to control the hitokiri within me? What will I find on this journey into the unknown?"

He sat contemplating these questions watching the flames of the fire dance in the ring of stones. The real problem was his past, his other identity that was plain for anyone to see. Even though he had changed his clothing and had hidden the scar on his left cheek under a bandage, he knew his fighting Ki, the way he carried and handled the sword at his side and his red hair would give him away. Aside of the cross-shaped scar on his left cheek, his red hair was the one thing about his identity that was known even among the general populace. Everyone knew the Hitokiri Battousai had red hair and a cross shaped scar even if they also thought he was ten feet tall with glowing red eyes and a sword made of fire.

Kenshin sighed as the wind tugged at his hair, blowing it into his face. He pushed it back with his hand and wondered what perverse spirit had made him look so different from everyone else around him. His fair skin, purple eyes and red hair marked him as of foreign blood as surely as it also marked him as Battousai. During the war and in an effort to hide his hair, he had darkened it to help him better blend into the darkness he walked in. Even after he became a bodyguard he still darkened it until it was more auburn then red. He watched a strand of it wave in front of his eyes and he pushed it back again with his hand. It had returned to its natural shade of red after only a few days on the road. It was no longer a muted shade of red but the fiery red of a sunset.

"This hair of mine…it will give my identity away…"

He stared glumly into the fire, feeling the wind tug at his hair and clothes, lost in thought. Several silent moments had passed when suddenly he was jerked out of his reverie by that silence, which seemed to cloak everything around him. In an instant he had dosed the fire with some dirt and grabbed his still unused sakabatou from where it rested at his side.

He waited, his heart racing, though his outward appearance was calm, while his eyes quickly adjusted to the darkness. He sent out his Ki in search of the disturbance, hoping it was just some wild animal. He sensed nothing unusual in the woods around him but he remained watchful, his eyes scanning the surrounding forest. After a few moments he heard a strangled cry and the sound of swords clashing. It was behind him and several feet to the left, deeper into the forest.

Swiftly and silently he ran, hoping he wouldn't be too late to save whoever it was. This was the first chance he had to see if he could live by the words he had spoken a few weeks ago: 'to find a way to protect the people living in this new era without killing men'. He ran on, the sound of battle getting clearer with each stride, the cries becoming more desperate. He was close enough to understand the words now.

"Please…save us…someone help us…" These words were spoken over and over again and they echoed in Kenshin's mind.

"I have to save them if I can."

He would have liked nothing better then to burst into the clearing ahead of him but he knew it would not be wise to go into battle without at least knowing how many he faced. He stopped his headlong flight and paused to look into the clearing. There appeared to be eight men attacking a group of women and children. Kenshin scanned the area, seeking the guards that must have guarded this group on their journey. He found them nearby, all slain and covered in their own blood. The attackers were laughing at what they had done, gloating over their prizes.

"This one will fetch a good price at a brothel," said one of the attackers as he reached for one of the women huddled on the ground, lust in his eyes. 

His hand never reached her. One moment there was nothing to prevent him from doing so and the next a sword was descending onto his forearm, which snapped under the force of the blow. The man then felt the blade slam into his ribs and he fell to the ground stunned. The others looked up in surprise at the young swordsman who has seemingly appeared from nowhere. He was standing in front of the women and children with his sword sheathed. His face was grim and his eyes narrow.

"You will not touch these innocents," he said with quiet sternness.

He glared at the men and they all began to tremble. They did not know who this red-haired youth was but he knew how to use the strange non-lethal sword at his side. In the back of their minds, something about a deadly swordsman with red hair flickered but they soon forgot all thought as the stranger spoke again.

"You will leave this place and never return and you will never bother others along this road again."

"Who are you to give us orders, whelp?" said the largest of the remaining attackers and, as if this was a signal of some kind, the entire group charged him. 

The women began to scream but even before the attackers had moved, Kenshin was among them. He slashed at them with blinding speed careful to make all his blows ones that would immobilize rather than kill his opponents. Soon five of the eight where down with nothing worse than broken bones and bruised flesh. The other three stared at him in amazement, clearly never having seen anything like his technique before. Two of them fled, running farther into the forest as fast as their legs could carry them. The only one left was the large man that had spoken a few moments previous. 

"You're pretty good with that sword, boy, but you will never be able to defeat me with your tricks."

Kenshin looked calmly at the man, his sword sheathed again. He said nothing and gave away nothing. The other samurai wore his daisho with the ease of a man who knew how to use them. He had sword calluses on both hands and his movements were quick and deliberate. In a few moments Kenshin had calculated that his opponent was the leader of the group, that he was at least as fast as he, himself, was, that he could use both of his swords with equal proficiency and that he would not be as easily defeated as the others. The one thing he did not know was the technique the man used. 

"But that will come in a moment." he thought to himself.

He stared at the man, his eyes narrow and his hand held loosely over the sakabatou's hilt, preparing to execute one of the Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu's Battoujutsu moves.

"You will not lay a hand on one of these innocents." he said, his eyes flashing amber and his flat voice cold and dark.

"And you will be the one that stops me? I find that highly unlikely." The man laughed and drew his two swords. "Your idealistic game is over now, boy."

The man charged, swinging his two swords in two diagonal slashes. Kenshin blocked with his sword and danced around the leader, getting in behind him. He slashed at the man's back only to find his blade blocked. The leader laughed and spun with his two swords outstretched. Kenshin leapt into the air, avoiding both swords and landed a few feet from his opponent. The leader charged again, this time thrusting with his wakizashi at Kenshin's chest. Kenshin blocked that move but the leader's katana slammed into the side of his head.

Momentarily stunned, Kenshin felt the man's foot connect with his stomach. He felt himself fall to his knees and he remained in that position for several minutes, unable to move. The leader laughed again and the women began to scream. Kenshin saw the katana coming toward him, aimed at his head. He had a fleeting thought of the irony of the Hitokiri Battousai being slain by a common bandit before he felt the impact of two swords clashing. Somehow he had managed to block his opponent's sword with his own. He shouted a battle cry and ascended into the air, narrowly avoiding a second slash from the leader's wakizashi. Kenshin rose rapidly into the air and hovered there for a split second before descending again, landing a powerful blow on the leader's shoulder using a modified version of the Ryu Tsui Sen he had been practicing for some time. The leader fell to the ground, unconscious. Kenshin landed hard and fell forward as the world began to spin around him. He could hear the women and children talking but it was muffled and seemed to come from a great distance and he couldn't seem to see anything. The night grew darker around him and the all noise ceased as unconsciousness took him.


	2. Chapter Two

Kokoro No Itami Nakunaru Made Zutto

Kokoro No Itami Nakunaru Made Zutto 

By: Hitokiri Gentatsu

Rating: PG

Author's Note/Disclaimer: Here is the second chapter. Enjoy. I don't own Rurouni Kenshin or any familiar characters. I only own the ones I created. There is no money being made in the writing of this story. 

**Chapter 2: The Path of the Sword**

"The Sword of Mitsurugi should be wielded for the people of the world, for the protection of the weak."

First Principle of Hiten Mitsurugi

OVA 1 (Subbed)

Images flashed painfully across his mind but he could make no sense of them. They were full of darkened alleyways; smoke covered battlefields, screams and, over all of it, the smell of blood. He tossed and turned on the threadbare futon, mumbling incoherently and crying out in his delirium.

"Please forgive, please forgive," he cried out to the faceless men that he had slain. 

They laughed and told him he would never be forgiven. He cried in despair asking for forgiveness again. He moaned in agony and through off the blankets that had been put over his shivering form. The woman who tended him reached over to cover him again and whispered that everything would be all right soon. Voices wove in and out of his dreams and his body seemed to be at once on fire and frozen. His head throbbed in time with his heart and he heard himself groan. He could also hear soft feminine voices and the higher pitched voices of children. He awoke slightly trying to find out where he was.

"Will he be alright, Shihobu-san? You can make him better can't you? He did come to our rescue and he protected me," said a young boy of about eight as he watched Kenshin tossing and turning on the futon.

"I am doing my best, Masahiro-chan but it would help me greatly if you would go to the river and fetch some water."

Kenshin heard small feet running across the floor and the sound of a door being slid open. He felt to tired to open his eyes and his head hurt horribly. He moved his hand to gingerly explore the wound. It appeared to be a shallow cut on the left side of his head. It appeared to no longer be bleeding but it really hurt. He hissed in pain and heard someone turn around.

"You shouldn't touch the wound." 

His eyes flew open at the order and he saw a hazy image of a woman in nun's clothing but he could tell nothing else about her. His eyes remained unfocused and he tried to see where he was but could make out nothing about the room. 

"Drink this, now. It will help you rest more comfortably. You will not be going anywhere anytime soon. You have a fever on top of everything else."

Kenshin mutely took the chipped cup and drank down the bitter medicine. Then he laid back and stared up at the ceiling, listening to every sound around him since his eyes were not working properly, hoping this would tell him something about where he was. He could hear other voices outside the room he was in, mostly children's voices and he could smell food cooking somewhere nearby. Wherever he was, there was no doubt he was safe for the moment. 

"But for how long?" the hitokiri part of his mind wondered. "How long before someone figures out who you are?"

He ignored that part for once and let himself feel safe even if it was only for a few days. He closed his eyes again, too tired and in too much pain to really care what happened to him as long as he could rest for a few days first. Soon sleep claimed him.

*

Several days passed for Kenshin in somewhat peaceful rest, although nightmares full of blood and death still plagued his sleep. He became used to the sound of the voices of many people around him again and took his medicine without complaint. On a morning about two weeks later, Kenshin awoke to find himself, for once, alone in the room. He stared at the ceiling and took stock of himself. His head still ached but it was a dull ache and not the throbbing pain it had been before. Carefully, he sat up and found that he was no longer dizzy and the room was not spinning around him. He smiled and slowly got to his feet, feeling a little weak from too much time spent in bed. He looked around the room and found his clothing folded neatly on the floor near the futon. His sakabatou was leaning against the wall next to them. 

He got dressed carefully and then took his sword from were it rested and carefully unsheathed it to look at the blade for any sign of damage. The blade looked shiny and unblemished as if he had never used it. He smiled at the reflection of himself in the blade, remembering how he had gotten the blade. 

He had been trying to leave the Ishinishi camp without anyone noticing right after the Battle of Tobu Fushimi. He had gotten all the way out to the edge of camp and was making his way along a path that would carry him away from the life of blood and terror he had known when he had paused, sensing someone nearby. 

He scanned the area and found that Arai Shakuu was watching him as he walked out of camp. Shakuu was the wordsmith who had made the sword he had once carried and had since left behind on his last battlefield having no use for the blade on the path he intended to take. He stopped several feet and waited to see what Shakuu would say to him. They had talked of Kenshin's intended path and how he could never exist without a sword at his side. That was when Shakuu had given him the sakabatou and left him, telling him to return to him in Kyoto when it was broken and if he still believed in his idealistic nonsense. He smiled at the memory.

"With this sword I can begin a new life and I can atone for the evils I have committed with my hands. I will find the path to peace."

He took a few practice swings with it and found that it was a bit heavier than his former sword had been and that the balance was different do to the fact that the blade was reversed. 

"This will mean that all my attacks will be slowed somewhat." He sheathed the sword and walked out of the room following the sound of voices, think about ways to adapt his Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu to his new sword. "The first thing would be to practice with it."

He walked down a small hallway until he came to an open doorway through which he could see children playing and some nuns gathered watching over them. He stood in the doorway watching them play, a small smile on his face.

"Welcome back to the world of the living, Young Swordsman."

Kenshin turned his head and looked at the woman he had felt come up behind him. She was dressed in nun's clothing and had a very pretty face, with shining eyes he saw for but a moment. Kenshin recognized her as the one the bandits were about to rape when he arrived. She was about his own age and her dark eyes were downcast, showing respect to someone of a higher rank then her own.

"What happened? Where am I?" he asked quietly.

"You took a blow to your head and became delirious with a high fever. You are in small shrine, which was our intended destination when you came to our rescue. In gratitude for saving us you may stay here until you are completely well. My sisters and I are grateful for you help."

Kenshin smiled then his face grew serious. 

"Arigato…Miss?

"Shihobu."

"Shihobu-san, I can't stay long. There may be people after me. I will not put you or the children in any more danger."

"No one visits this shrine, which is no longer on the main road. You should be safe enough here. Who are you?"

Kenshin paused and watched the children playing nearby before answering, fully expecting to be thrown out as soon as he uttered the next words.

"Himura Kenshin," he said and inwardly he cringed, knowing what the reaction was likely to be from his host.

"Welcome, Himura-san. Stay here as long as it takes to fully recover." She smiled at him and then began to watch the children too. 

He stood in the doorway in shock. There had been no outburst from her. No words telling him to leave the shrine. Nothing. He lifted a hand to the bandage that still covered his cross-shaped scar.

"Maybe she truly does not know who I am." He smiled at the thought. "And yet I will not put them in more danger."

He walked a little farther outside and the children stopped their play to look at him intently for several moments before returning to it. He continued to watch them for a few minutes then he turned to Shihobu.

"Who are these children?" he asked quietly, guessing from her sad eyes what her answer would be. 

"They are the orphans of this war. They parents died either in the fighting or because of disease. My sisters and I are taking them to a temple in a town several days journey from Kyoto."

Kenshin felt saddened at this and he briefly wondered how many widows and orphans he had made with his sword. He leaned against the doorframe, unmoving, his head bowed and his eyes closed, for several minutes. Then he walked completely outside and sat against the wall, watching the children, with his sword propped against his shoulder, a sad smile on his face. After a few moments, the children stopped their play and gathered around him. The all smiled up at him and he couldn't help but smile back, remembering the children he had played with and gotten to know while living with Tomoe in Otsu.

"How are all of you?" he asked them gently.

There was a chorus of "goods" and some muted giggling.

"Do you know any new games?" one girl asked.

"What's your name?" another asked.

"How are you feeling today?" 

"What kind of sword is that?"

Kenshin's mind reeled from so many questions but he answered all of them as if each one was the most important question he had ever answered because in the mind of a child all questions, no matter how trivial they sounded were important. He smiled down at them and looked into each smiling face, suddenly realizing that this was what his master had been trying to teach him. This was what the Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu was to be used for. 

"Shisho, if I had only listened to you then. You tried to tell me that the Hiten Mitsurugi Ryu was to be used to protect the weak but only as a sword that was under the control of no one but the one who wields it. I would not listen to you then because I was too stubborn. I was too caught up in my own sense of justice and my own idealistic notions of changing the world by the edge of my sword. Now, I understand what you meant at last. I hope it is not too late for me."

He shook his head to clear it of past memories and then he rose and walked out into the woods were the children had been playing motioning them to follow.

"Come, I will show you a new game."

*

They played until it was too dark to see and Kenshin returned to the shrine carrying two of the smallest children in his arms, others trailing behind him. They were all moving as silently as they could. Kenshin had invented a new game on the spot for them to play and they had enjoyed it immensely. Kenshin first showed them how he could move so silently that they could not hear him. Then he began to sneak up on them and poking or tickling them. The object of the game was to catch him before he could reach his intended 'target'. Soon they were all laughing and shouting and Kenshin enjoyed himself, while getting in some practicing at the same time.

"This has been the first peaceful time I have known since Tomoe died…" The thought surprised him and he smiled as he returned the children to their "parents".

After the evening meal had been served and the children had been sent to sleep, Kenshin sat outside the shrine, watching the stars come out in a patch of sky that could be seen through a break in the trees. He sat with his sword once more propped against his shoulder and thought about the day.

"I enjoyed today greatly, there is no use in denying that fact but the longer I stay, the more danger they will be in. I cannot allow that and yet…" He looked through the open door and saw the sleeping forms of the children and the seated forms of the nuns at prayer. He knew that he couldn't just abandon them here. "They have no one else to protect them and there are probably more bandits or worse things along this road. It is my duty to escort them to the next village."

He sighed but knew this was the only thing he could do. This was, after all, the reason he had left the field of battle now a month ago and it was the purpose of those who wielded the sword of Mitsurugi. He continued to watch the stars and to think. Soon all was silent except for the quiet murmur of the nuns as they began to talk among themselves. There were four of them from what Kenshin could tell and they were of varying ages, although he only knew the name of the one who had cared for him. He touched the bandaged wound on his head, which was now itching in addition to the small amount of pain that still lingered about it. The bandage would be taken off tomorrow, according to Shihobu. She had not, however, even asked him about the bandage, which hid his scar, and for that he was thankful.

"Strange that a complete stranger would want to help me of all people or that they would even care about what happened to me at all." He put his hand on his left cheek and thought about this new sensation. "No one has really ever cared for me before except my parents and Tomoe. All anyone had wanted from me was my talent with a sword."

He had sat for several moments, lost in thought, when he felt a hand on his shoulder. He shook his head and looked up to see Shihobu looking down at him.

"What has you troubled, Himura-san?" she asked quietly. "There seems to be a great sorrow around you and your sleep is never untroubled. And there is the unhealed wound on your left cheek that I can tell is not recent but is instead years old. Why would one who is so young carry more sorrow then any man twice his age?"

He looked up at her with the piercing gaze of the hitokiri and a cold voice in his mind said: "She knows…she knows. She must die." 

He shook his head to clear it of the hitokiri's voice and coldness. "You don't know that. She's only seen the scar…that does not mean that she knows who I am. Besides, I am not you anymore. I don't need you."

"That's what you think now but you will need me again. I will be waiting when the time comes. How long can you keep this up? How long before you must kill again? And how long before that woman connects the scar and hair with the Hitokiri Battousai?" The cold voice continued.

"What is so troubling to you, Himura-san?"

"Nothing…nothing I can talk about right now." He looked up at the stars again, trying to steady his emotions, which were surely visible on his face and to push the hitokiri from the surface of his thoughts.

Shihobu bowed to her head for a moment and then looked at him.

"You have lost someone dear to you?" she said with quiet certainty and Kenshin's head whipped around to look at her.

"Yes…but…how did?"

"Something in your eyes told me so." She paused a moment before speaking again. "I am sure she would not want you to be so sad. I am sure she would want you to let go of this pain and move on with your life."

She watched his face as Kenshin continued to watch the stars as they blurred before him. 

"How can I let her go? I deserve this pain as punishment for what I did to her…to us," he thought, remembering the brief moment of peace he had found in the midst of war and how he had eventually destroyed it.

Tears rolled down his cheeks and the stars above grew blurrier. Once again he felt the pain and emptiness in his heart that he had been left there the night he had destroyed his own happiness as he had done to so many others. The night Tomoe had been taken from him by his own hand.

"The pain is still there. The feeling is the same as when you lay dying in my arms from the wound I gave you. You told me it was 'better this way' but even now I fail to see how it is better. If it were not for me, you and your love would still be alive. You would have been happy. Why can I not get over you? Why do I still see you in dreams and feel you nearby? Why must I continue to live with this broken heart?" He hung his head and tears continued to trace a path down his cheeks.

"I'm sure she forgives you."

"Forgiveness? Can there really be such a thing? There can never be for one such as I. There is too much blood on my hands. Nothing can erase it. Nothing," he thought to himself. 

He turned a tearstained face to Shihobu and tried to smile. "I hope there can be forgiveness for me someday but right now the only thing I can do is to try to atone for what I have done. I will take you and the others to the temple you spoke of. I will make sure you get there safely."

Shihobu saw the tears and the pain in his eyes, knowing she had guessed rightly. This young man was suffering and in as much need as the orphan children she cared for. His soul was a tormented one and she could almost guess why.

"Arigato, Himura-san. I was about to ask if you would be willing to journey with us for a little while." She turned back to the shrine and walked back inside before looking over her shoulder at him again. "You should really get some rest."

"I will." Kenshin said, his voice laced with sadness.

Shihobu checked on the sleeping children before heading to her own bed. She lay down and idly watched Himura as he continued to sit just outside the door. There was something almost familiar about him, something she had heard about a swordsman with red hair and a cross-shaped scar. It was something important; she knew it was but the harder she tried to concentrate on what it was the harder it was to bring that thought to the fore. She lay awake several moments trying to remember what it was but eventually fell into an uneasy sleep.

Kenshin continued to watch the stars, thinking about what Shihobu had said to him, the ache still in his heart where his love for Tomoe had once lived. Only the stars and moon saw his tears and he did not sleep that night.


	3. Chapter Three

Kokoro No Itami Nakunaru Made Zutto

Kokoro No Itami Nakunaru Made Zutto

By: Hitokiri Gentatsu

Rating: PG

Author's Note/Disclaimer: All the usual disclaimers apply to this chapter. Thank you all for you comments and reviews. Please sit back now and enjoy chapter three.

**Chapter Three: Muga Kuragari~Shadow Village**

"…I want to rescue with my own hands those who are suffering. Many people, countless lives, as many as I can…I must leave in order to do so."

Himura Kenshin

OVA 1

(Subtitled)

They returned to the Nakasendo Road again after a few days rest. The children were gathered around Kenshin as he walked slowly to accommodate their smaller steps. They were a chattering mass begging for stories or for him to lift them up and carry them piggyback. His heart lightened seeing these orphaned children still managed to find happiness in the smallest flower or tallest tree in spite of the war that raged around them and which had taken their parents from them.

"Maybe I should think more like they do, to have more hope about the future…"

He was slowly beginning to believe that he could follow the path of peace that he had chosen for himself now. He could use his sword the way it was meant to be used, to defend those trying to live in peace. He would now be the one in control of his own sword. He smiled, watching some of the children race each other to next patch of sunlight.

"This is the reason why I made that vow to Tomoe. It was to protect children like the ones in Otsu and like these orphans. To protect those who cannot protect themselves from the evils of man. Tomoe…" He laid his hand on his left cheek and saw her face once more looking as calm and serene as he remembered it. "I will protect them and many others. I will be the guardian of other people's happiness. I will use the second chance you gave me to do as I promised." 

He put his hand on the hilt of his sakabatou and looked up at the sky for a moment, feeling the lingering presence of Tomoe nearby and smelling white plums for a moment if only in memory. Then he turned his attention back on the children that were in his charge. He watched them, his senses alert for any sign of trouble but his heart more relaxed then it had been since Otsu. The nuns were among the children, watching even as he did to make sure there were no stragglers or ones left behind. He knew their names now. Two of them, Keiko and Setsuko, were hardly older than some of the oldest orphans in their charge. Then there was Shihobu, who was laughing at something one of the youngest girls had said. The fourth nun was somewhat older than the other three, with narrow eyes and a sour expression that reminded Kenshin oddly of the captain of the third Shinsengumi squad, Saito Hajime. She seemed to glare at everyone and everything around her. There seemed no way to please her. Her name was Takako and Kenshin always had the urge to stay as far from her as he could. For some reason he couldn't put a finger to he didn't trust her and, though he had never met her before a few weeks ago, he could sense an intense hatred aimed at him coming from her. He could see no reason for her hatred though as they had not met before. 

He could feel her eyes boring into his back as he walked among a group of children a few paces ahead of her. He felt another intense wave of hatred coming at him from her before it was shut off as completely as if it had never been at all. He looked back at her with the corner of his eye as he reached over to prevent one of the young boys from falling.

"Hiroshi-chan, you should be more careful," he said quietly as he lifted the boy into his arms.

"Gomen-ni, Kenii." The boy laughed as Kenshin swung him around in a circle before setting him on his feet again.

Soon all ten of the children in his charge wanted him to swing them to.

"Maybe later," he said in answer to their pleas and begging. "Right now the sun will soon be setting and we need to start looking for a good place to camp for the night…"

"We will be sleeping in the next village. It is not far and it has already been arranged."

Kenshin turned to look back at the speaker who turned out to be Takako. She had a look of triumph on her face and she glared at Kenshin as if in challenge, barely contained rage smoldering in her gaze. Kenshin stood there mutely with every hitokiri alarm ringing in his head and a cold voice overlaying those alarms.

_"It's a trap…She knows who you are…she must die…"_

Kenshin clamped down on the hitokiri within himself and looked at Takako with a smile and wide, innocent eyes.

"Whatever you wish," he said calmly as one of the children began to pull on his sleeve.

"Kenii…Kiyoshi and Ayame want a story, please."

He looked at Takako for one moment longer then, as much as that part of himself that was thinking like a hitokiri told him not to, he turned his back on her to turn his attention back to the children. He could feel her eyes on him again as he began to tell those children gathered around him a story about a great and noble samurai who help those in need. The children listened in awe at the story he spun, some of which was drawn from his own experiences. Then they went to play again as soon as the story was finished. He heard footsteps behind him and found Shihobu looking at him, an odd expression on her face.

"You are so good with children," Shihobu said as she came to join him. She said this as if surprised by the knowledge.

He smiled at her and watched the children playing.

"It is to protect children like these that I became a swordsman. Children are precious treasures that cannot be replaced, especially in times such as these," he said quietly

Takako walked by them then and muttered something that Shihobu was unable to catch but Kenshin heard as if the speaker had paused to stand next to him.

"Strange thoughts coming from a killer of so many men."

Kenshin's eyes widened and the hitokiri began to wake again.

"I shall have to have a talk with Takako soon," he thought, pushing the hitokiri back again.

He continued to watch the children, trying to ignore the warning alarm going off in his head and trying to ignore the cold hitokiri's whispering voice that was demanding he strike out. He carefully watched the road in front of him, keeping an eye on the children and listening for any sound that might warn him of an attack.

Nothing happened but Kenshin refused to relax his guard. He'd seen to many people die because they had let their guard down at the wrong moment. He narrowed his eyes, which became faintly amber, looking around with all of his senses, seeking the source of the disturbance his Ki was sensing. He couldn't seem to sense anything at all, or at least nothing that would seem on the surface to be dangerous. Something was definantly wrong here. Something he couldn't put a finger on.

_"We should attack before whoever has a chance to attack us,"_ the hitokiri's voice whispered from the depths of his mind.

He shook his head to clear of the cold voice that echoed faintly. "I have told you before…I will never attack unless attacked first and that I would never kill again. I will wait until the enemy makes himself known."

_"That is a dangerous attitude for a hitokiri to have…"_

"I am no longer a hitokiri. I left that life behind me when I left Kyoto."

_"If you wait too long we will all die including the ones we must_ _protect,"_ the logical voice in his head replied.

Kenshin froze. Death was something he had grown to accept as a part of his existence as a hitokiri. All samurai were prepared to die for their lords or clans. He had certainly not expected to live beyond that existence nor had he expected to survive the battles after he had turned from the shadows of the hitokiri. There were not many things he feared but there was one thing. Above all else he feared death the most but even so he would not let them die in his place even if it meant his own life.

_"Come…"_ The hitokiri's voice sounded in his mind again, pushing him into action.

"I will not attack. I will not kill."

_"How long will you allow yourself to be deluded by this idealistic nonsense?"_

"As long as it takes for…"

_"For what? Atonement. Forgiveness. Those who live by the sword must die by the sword. You know this is true."_

"Someday they will forgive…"

_"Some people will never forgive, never forget."_

"If I can get far enough away…"

_"Our enemies will still seek us out. They will follow us."_

"I have left no enemies living thanks to you. And they do not need to seek me for they are always with me." Kenshin spared a thought for all the men he had slain whom he still saw in his worst nightmares.

_"They are not all dead. There are still some members of the Shinsengumi. There is still him. They will hunt us to the ends of the earth."_

Kenshin thought again of Saito Hajime who was one of the few men to have fought him and lived to tell of it. Saito was at least his equal in swordsmanship. But he had disappeared in the last battle at Tobu Fushimi.

"Himura-san look what we found."

Kenshin was pulled back to the present by a child's urgent voice. He pulled his mind out of the past and pushed the hitokiri out of his thoughts again to look at the two children who were pulling at his hands.

"What is it you have found, Hiroshi-chan and Midori-chan?" he said smiling down at them.

The children took his hands and pulled him forward.

"Just wait till you see it," Midori said excitedly.

"Yeah, wait…" Hiroshi echoed his sister, waving his tiny hands in the air.

The trees had been gradually disappearing as the road they were on began to climb higher into the mountains. Soon the only the tops of the trees could be seen. There was a bend in the road ahead and several of the children had stopped to watch something. Kenshin walked into the bend and suddenly saw a wide valley spread out below him. There was a stream running through it next to what appeared to be a small village. The water of the stream was glinting in the light of the setting sun. The village looked peaceful and quiet, undisturbed by the war that raged nearby.

Kenshin stood still, mesmerized by the light glowing on the water, watching it dance as the water moved. His memory flashed back to Otsu, which in some way resembled this unnamed village.

"We will be staying here for a few days before moving on," Takako said, glaring down at the village below them and then at Kenshin. "Come."

She stomped away toward a path off the road that led to the village with everyone else following her. Kenshin walked at the back of the group, to keep an eye out for any stragglers along with Shihobu. 

"May I ask you a question?" He glanced at her as he watched some of the children ahead of them began to run down the path.

"Yes…"

"Has Takako-san always been so…" Kenshin paused for a moment to think of the right word to describe her attitude. "Has she always been so gruff and bad-tempered?"

Shihobu looked at him, a sad look in her eyes.

"Takako came to us about a year ago after a great personal tragedy, which she has never spoken of. For weeks after coming to the temple she would not speak or interact with anyone. When she finally recovered enough to talk, she told us that she could not stand the evils of the outside world any longer and that she wished to embrace the inner peace of a nun's life."

Kenshin listened to her words.

"She does not seem to be finding peace with us though. She has always been gruff and bad-tempered but for some reason she has been more so of late."

"May I ask something else?" At Shibohu's nod he continued. "She seems to hate me but I can think of nothing I have done to have her react in such a way. Can you offer me a reason why?"

Shibohu looked at him. "I have no idea why she would hate you."

They continued to walk in silence, making sure that none of the children strayed from the path. Kenshin's thoughts were on Takako. There could only be one reason for her to hate him as much as she appeared to. 

*

They entered the village at just after dusk. The streets were quiet and candles flickered behind the paper windows of the houses. The village was the very picture of tranquility and peaceful times but there was a hint of tension under the peaceful façade the village presented and several of the houses had fallen into disrepair. Kenshin sensed hostile eyes watching them and especially him the moment they entered the village. 

"Things are not always what they seem." Kenshin knew this to be true. His enemies had constantly underestimated him because of his slight build and youthful appearance. "I wonder what is happening here? Maybe there is some way I could help."

The group arrived at another shrine, this one in the center of town. Wanting some time alone, Kenshin took a water bucket and went to the nearby stream to draw some water for the group's use. It was a task that usually helped to clear his mind but it was not so on this night. His thoughts had turned dark ever since his earlier conversation with Shibohu and the feeling of wrongness he had been experiencing all day continued to intensify. He sat by the stream's edge and watched the moonlight reflect off the surface of the water, staining it a bright silver.

"Am I destined to forever discover people whose happiness has been stolen from them by my sword."

_"Probably but they were all evil men and evil must be slain. You once believed this. You once understood that the only way to_ _protect people was to kill,"_ Battousai's cold voice said softly inside his head.

Kenshin shivered at the coldness in the hitokiri's voice but he held firm in his belief.

"I will find a better way to protect others. A way that doesn't involve killing," he said firmly.

The hitokiri within him laughed a dark, frozen laugh. _"The Shinsengumi say: Aku Soku Zan…Sin Swiftly Slay. To do otherwise leaves evil free to pray upon others. You once believed this with all your heart and soul"_

"That may be but those same 'evil' men were just trying to live their lives and they had families waiting for them to return. I took the lives of countless men and the happiness from untold numbers of families, including my own."

Kenshin felt a wave of grief and rage within his heart; grief for the loss of someone who both parts of himself had grown to love and anger reserved for himself alone for failing to protect her happiness as he had promised to do. The hitokiri's voice remained silent, awash in his own raw grief and anger.

"I cannot allow myself to let that happen to anyone else again. I may have failed to protect my own happiness but I intend to protect the happiness of those who will be trying to live in peace in this new era. I will do this with all of my strength and with all that I am." He wrapped his fingers around the hilt of his sakabatou and smiled a slight smile. "The sword that kills will be forever sealed away from the world as will the hitokiri within me."

The hitokiri chuckled dryly. _"I consent to this arrangement for now. However you have spent most of your life killing men therefore the urge to do so will always remain within your heart."_

"I am prepared for that." Kenshin's eyes shimmered amber for a moment.

_"There will come a day when you will not be able to resist the call to slay again, either because someone you care for is in danger or your own life is threatened. If you should kill again, and you will, you will never be able to look back again. You will become a hitokiri again and a hitokiri you will remain never being able to return to this path again. You will not long walk this path."_

"We shall see," he murmured as he made his way back to the shrine with the water.

*

The evening meal was a quiet one with tension underlying everything that was said or done. The children lay awake long past their normal hour and they lay huddled in a tense group around the place Kenshin sat. Kenshin leaned against the wall with his eyes closed and his sword resting nearby. The children's eyes were all on him and he knew that they saw him as their protector. Shibohu and the two younger nuns were in another corner quietly talking. Takako was somewhere outside washing the dishes.

Kenshin waited until all the children had fallen into slumber before leaving his corner of the shrine to sit outside under the sky once more. He watched the stars twinkle above him, trying to still the uncertainty in his heart. He wondered if the hitokiri he had been was right about this path he had chosen. Was it just a foolish notion for him to believe that he could ever be anything more than a murderer? Was it hopeless for him to believe ha could atone for years of bloodshed?

For several minutes he sat in silent battle with himself but he could not still that small, lingering doubt in his heart that he could exist only as a rurouni. He had no doubt that the path he had chosen was right and honorable but he was still unsure if he was the one best suited to walk it. The hitokiri within was strong and his need for blood great. Could he be controlled? Did Kenshin have the strength necessary to fight this inner war? Could he survive without that part of himself?

"How long will I be able to walk this path?"

Kenshin did not have an answer to these questions but maybe, if he was giving time, he would. In the meantime there were things he needed to do, not the least of which was practicing to get used to the sakabatou's strange weight.

"Now is as good a time as any," he thought as he stood and walked into the courtyard of the temple. 

For several hours he practiced move after move with the sakabatou, noting that each one was slowed a fraction just as he had suspected they would be. He thought about it and decided that it probably wouldn't matter if his attacks were somewhat slower then before as they were still faster than anyone else's would be. Still it wouldn't hurt to train daily with the new blade until he got the feel of it and got used to the way its weight pulled the blade differently then he was used to. It also wouldn't hurt to speed up his attacks slightly to make up for the lack of speed being caused by the reversal of the dull and sharp edges of the sakabatou. He would begin with the easiest techniques first and then move to the more advanced when had completely mastered those.

"The hardest techniques to return to full speed and power will be the batoujutsu moves. A sakabatou is not made from such attacks." He looked at his reverse blade katana and pondered. He decided that if there were a way to make those attacks work using such a weapon he would be the one to find it. "I was not named Battousai for no reason after all. I will simply have to remaster those techniques as well. There must be some way to do so." 

Kenshin trained for the next hour, never knowing that the moon and stars were not the only witnesses to his training session. 

"So the Hitokiri Battousai shows himself at last." A shadow moved among the nearby trees. "We will met again old friend and this time your life will be mine."


	4. Chapter Four

Kokoro No Itami Nakunaru Made Zutto

Kokoro No Itami Nakunaru Made Zutto

By: Hitokiri Gentatsu

Rating: PG

Author's Note/Disclaimer: I don't own Rurouni Kenshin. He belongs to Nobuhiro Watsuki, Shueisha 'Jump Comics', and Fuji Television. I am making no money with this story so please don't sue but feel free to review. Thanks and enjoy.

** **

**Chapter 4: Rurouni's Heart, Hitokiri's Soul**

** **

"No, he will start to feel divided inside. Part of him will be his true self. The other part will be a ruthless hitokiri."

Kogoro Katsura

OVA 1

(Subtitled)

After practicing for several hours, Kenshin fell into an uneasy slumber that lasted for no more than half an hour. His dreams were full of screams and streets that ran crimson with spilled blood. He could smell it all around him and feel it on his hands and face. The smell and feel of it seemed to follow him no matter how many times he washed nor where he went to hide from it. He looked down at the katana in his hand and saw that the blade was stained crimson. He screamed then and that scream was what jerked him back to the present.

He sat up, his eyes wide and staring and his breathe coming out in short gasps. He found that he was sweating and brushed a hand across his forehead to remove the sweat that gathered there. The night around him was silent and a small breeze stirred the branches of the trees nearby, chilling his body. But for all the apparent peace and quiet around him, Kenshin couldn't relax enough to sleep again. He felt the prickle that indicated that he was being watched and it made him uneasy. It was as if something was laying in wait around the corner, waiting for him to make a mistake.

"Something here is not right." He rose from his place by the door and walked out into the courtyard again, taking in every shadow and pebble around him but there seemed to be nothing to cause his feeling of uneasiness. 

"This place…Why does it feel like I'm in Kyoto again, surrounded on every side by danger?"

He shivered at the thought as the air around him turned slightly chilly. This unnamed village felt like Kyoto did on the eve of a battle or to be more precise, something about this place or someone in the village was making his warrior instincts react as if he were still in the middle of a war zone like Kyoto. Kenshin could feel the hitokiri hovering once more near the surface of his thoughts but this time he made no effort to banish his darker side's voice. He stood tense and silent but nothing happened and eventually he went back to his relaxed position by the door, though he was not in the least bit as relaxed as his position indicated. His amber tinted eyes kept careful watch for danger while his mind was occupied in trying to figure out what was wrong here.

"Why am I so tense? I feel like I'm preparing for battle but there doesn't seem to be any reason for it. Why should this peaceful village 'feel' like Kyoto?"

The hitokiri's voice remained silent.

"Why do I feel as if something is about to happen?" He unsheathed his sakabatou and looked at its shining silver surface once more seeing the blood covered katana from his dream. As he sat transfixed by the image from his dream, the hitokiri within muttered, wishing for his katana that had been left behind on his last battlefield.

Kenshin smiled a cold smile but then shook his head and the runouni returned. He sheathed his sakabatou again and closed his eyes, taking his memory back to when they had entered the village earlier that evening.

"That was when this feeling began."

He replayed their entrance into the village in his mind but could find nothing out of the ordinary about either it or the village itself. He opened his eyes again and looked up at the sky studying it with his violet gaze.

"What is wrong here? What is seems out of place? Why does simply being here seem to affect me so?"

_"Maybe you fear they will find out who you are." _The logic of the hitokiri's statement could not be denied but…

"No, it's more than that. There is something going on here. I feel as if we are being watched."

"And so you are…" A voice spoke from the shadows.

Kenshin leapt from his position and found himself standing in the center of the courtyard, his hand over the sakabatou's hilt.

"Who are you?" the hitokiri's cold voice called quietly into the night as his amber eyes scanned the area for his foe.

"I would have expected the Hitokiri Battousai to remember me." The voice paused, sounding a bit disappointed. "It matters not. I have come to tell you that I will never let you leave this place alive. The blood that you have spilt cries out for vengeance and the souls of those who died by your hand cannot rest until you are dead. You have been judged and I have come to mete out the just punishment you deserve for you many crimes."

The Battousai's eyes narrowed and began to glow. Before Kenshin realized what had happened, Battousai had unsheathed the sakabatou and reversed the blade to the edged side. A sudden coldness came over him then as all emotions drained from him.

"Try and take me then," he said in a deadly calm voice.

"Now is not the time and this is not the place to spill your tainted blood. I will wait until the appropriate time and place to exact revenge for all those who died on the edge of the Hitokiri Battousai's sword. You will die as they died."

The words faded and Battousai scanned the area but the presence he had felt was gone. Calmly he sheathed his weapon and looked around once more before returning control back to Kenshin again.

_"Someone knows we are here. We should leave now before others get hurt."_ The Battousai's voice held a gentle note of concern and warmth for the children and their guardians, an odd sound for the cold voice of a killer to have.

"No. I promised to see them safely to their temple. I gave them my word and they need my help. I will not break their trust."

"But…"

"If I leave them, they will still be in danger. I will not leave them now that my word has been given."

The hitokiri within lapsed into silence once more and Kenshin's eyes turned back to their normal color again. Kenshin returned to his place by the doorway and spent the rest of the night in deep thought, always returning to the same question: "Which one of my many enemies has come for me at last?"

*

The next two days passed without incident, although the tension within both the village and the shrine grew greater as the days passed. Kenshin could see no reason for this, for outwardly everything appeared to be normal. But the longer he spent in and around the village the more he realized that things were anything but normal.

Although the village seemed to be prosperous, none of the villagers seemed to be benefiting from that prosperity and though the fields were full of crops, the villagers themselves appeared to be starving for lack of food. From these signs alone Kenshin guessed that someone was controlling the village, leaving only enough food and goods behind to insure that the villagers survived but only just. There were no men in the village except the very young and very old and all the women had a haunted look about them. Kenshin could only guess what they had been through. Their men were most likely off fighting or dead and someone had taken advantage of the situation to take over the village.

Despite this though the villagers were friendly toward the nuns and the children, though they were distinctly cold toward him. Whenever he went to the market or walked the streets of the town alone, the villagers either ignored him completely, shooting suspicious glances at him, or they went out of there way to insult him or try and do him injury. Kenshin began to dread walking through the town at all because of this but he could not allow even this to cause him to go back on his vow and leave altogether. They may not trust him, for whatever their reason, and he could accept that, but they needed his help and he could not leave them to their suffering any more than he could leave those who he was already protecting. It was his nature.

There was only one person in the entire village that even spoke to him and who didn't see him as some kind of a threat. Mishimoto Akira might be blind but he seemed to see things far more clearly for that blindness then the rest of the villagers did. Kenshin hoped Akira could tell him something about the people who were terrorizing the town. He needed more solid information than what could be gathered by overhearing conversations and Akira was the only one likely to give him such information.

Kenshin skirted the village proper and come to the back gate of what had once been the large Mishimoto estate on the edge of town. Mishimoto Akira had been a wealthy samurai of higher rank than Kenshin, who was well respected as a kind, just and honorable man. His wealth came not from corrupt dealings or evil intentions but from honest hard work. He had instilled the same ideals in those who served under him and had been only too happy to share his good fortune with others.

When the war came, he sent off his sons and retainers to fight for the protection of the Shogunate while he remained behind in the village to protect it with his own hand picked force, feeling he was to old to be involved in the fierce fighting in and around Kyoto. He had protected it for a time until something had happened to cause it to fall into its present state. Kenshin wanted to know what had happened and Akira was the best source he had for that information. Indeed he was Kenshin's only source for it.

Kenshin entered what was left of the main house, which consisted of two rooms. The rest of the manor had fallen into ruin and some of it looked as if it had been through fire. The barracks that once housed retainers were in a similar state as the house and whenever Kenshin passed them he was reminded of the fire he had found himself in the middle of when he discovered there were those in the Ishinishi who wanted him dead. He shook his head to clear it of thoughts of the past.

"Akira-san? Are you here?" Kenshin called out softly not wanting to startle the man. He looked around the two rooms and found no sign of his friend.

"Perhaps he is in the garden."

Kenshin stepped through the outer doorway, which was open and saw Akira-san sitting in the shade of gnarled old sakura tree. 

"Ah, Himura-san. Welcome. Please sit." Mishimoto Akira's head turned toward him at the sound of his entrance into the garden.

Kenshin bowed at the elderly samurai in a show of respect for both his age and rank. Then he sat down across from him and looked around the garden. The garden, like the rest of the estate was a mess. It showed the same signs of neglect and was full of weed-infested patches but here and there Kenshin could see that a loving hand had once cared for this garden and there were a few hearty plants that still managed to grow there.

"My wife, Katsuma, loved this tree and the garden around it. I loved to watch her out here among the flowers she loved so much. This garden was hers and when she died I hadn't the heart to keep it up." He smiled a sad smile and turned to face Kenshin, though he could see nothing through the puckered scar tissue that covered his eyes. "But you didn't come here to talk of gardens or to listen to the ramblings of a lonely old man."

Kenshin's eyes widened in surprise. "No I did not." He paused for a moment, unsure of how to continue. "Akira-san…I need to ask you about what happened here and about the one who controls this village through fear."

Akira's slightly stooped form straightened and he 'looked' at Kenshin again.

"Is it possible that you are the one?" he said, his hands reaching out to touch Kenshin's face.

Kenshin's first instinct was to move out of the way. He did not like people touching him, a holdover from his hitokiri days, but he remained as he was and let Akira touch his face. Akira's hand stopped when it reached the bandage that still covered the scar on Kenshin's cheek. Carefully he removed it and touched the scar underneath, tracing the two intersecting lines and strange look on his face. Then Akira dropped his hand from Kenshin's face then and spoke quietly.

"You are he, the one sent to free us from their control. Tell me Himura-san is your hair the color of a sunset and are your eyes full of amber fire? The scar you bare speaks of the pain and suffering you have already endured."

Kenshin gasped at Akira's description of him.

"I can tell by your reaction that I am right. My wife had a vision as she lay dying…she told me that a man who carried a deep sorrow within his heart, a former hitokiri seeking redemption, who would come here and save us. I will tell you what I know, Himura-san."

Akira took a sip of his tea and gathered his thoughts.

"Up until four years ago, Yasuo village was a small but prosperous town founded by my grandfather. He had been a ronin who managed to catch the eye of the local daimyo and his only child and heir, a daughter. They were wed and this land was given to them as a wedding gift. The village grew up around the estate. Everyone prospered and lived lives free from worry or fear. The estate passed from my grandfather, to his son and finally to me. The village grew and her people continued to prosper under my family's guidance. As you know, four years ago news of the fighting in Kyoto reached us here and I organized a group of fighting men mostly made up of my own retainers and a few of the village men who had been trained in the sword. They left and one by one others slipped off to join them until the only men, besides a few of my retainers and myself, were old men or young boys. I never dreamed someone would try and take advantage of this lack of warriors. We were to far from the fighting and there was nothing in our location that would be of strategic value to anyone.

"But someone took advantage of your situation."

"Yes," Akira bowed his head. "And nothing had been the same since. Will you help us, Himura-san?"

"Yes, I will but I need to know whatever you can tell me about them," he said with a quiet confidence.

"They come once every three months to pick up their spoils. As long as we give them whatever they want they let us live. Sometimes they take children to sell into slavery and they also take women by force and sometimes sell them too. Most of the children of the village are their own."

Kenshin's heart became full of rage at Akira's words and his eyes turned from purple to amber. He would not allow this suffering to continue not while he was there to stop it at its source.

"They enter the village from the north, always at night and they stay for several days. Their leader is a tall man, dressed in black, who is an expert swordsman and he comes with about fifty others. They are all armed mostly with swords.

"Arigato, Akira-san. I promise that I will do what I can to free this village from them." Kenshin's voice was dark with anger and colder than the deepest winter night.

"Himura-san?" Akira asked uncertainly, hearing the hard edge in Kenshin's voice. "Are you sure you can handle them alone? The leader blinded me for standing against him and I am a master."

Kenshin rose and placed a hand on the hilt of his sakabatou. "Yes, I can," he said in a calm voice.

"Then you are truly he, are you not? The one who controls the most ancient, secret and powerful of sword techniques not seen for generations? You are the strongest of the Ishinishi…"

"Yes, I am," Kenshin said very quietly, his voice once more that of the rurouni. "But could you not mention it to the others. I'd rather they didn't know who I really am."

Akira nodded in sympathy. "The road you walk will not be an easy one and your life will be difficult because of who you were."

"I am just beginning to realize just how difficult, Akira-san. However, this is the road I have chosen to follow no matter how hard it is to walk. This is the only way I can atone for the things I have done." He paused with his back to Akira. "Can you do something for me? Would you look after the nuns and the orphans who came here with me?"

"I will do my best."

"That is all I can ask. I cannot allow them to be unprotected and your sword is still strong."

Akira smiled at Kenshin and he knew that he had guessed right. Despite his blindness, Akira still trained with his sword daily, as any samurai must. There would be nothing for him to worry about on that end. Kenshin moved to leave the garden.

"Good luck, Himura-san."

"Arigato, Akira-san." He bowed and left. 

Kenshin left the estate via the same gate he entered by and retraced his steps on the outskirts of town until he reached the river. He needed to meditate and to prepare himself for the battle to come for it would be perhaps the most important one of his life. It would not only determine the future of Yasuo Village and the people who dwell there but it would also determine whether or not he could truly hold to his vow to never kill again.


	5. Chapter Five

Kokoro No Itami Nakunaru Made Zutto

**Kokoro No Itami Nakunaru Made Zutto**

By: Hitokiri Gentatsu

Rating: PG

Author's Note/Disclaimer: I don't own Rurouni Kenshin. He belongs to Nobuhiro Watsuki, Shueisha 'Jump Comics', and Fuji Television. 

**Chapter Five: "For the Protection of the Weak"**

** **

**"**Kenjitsu is a method for murder. You can decorate it with all sorts of pretty words but that is what it is."

Hiko Seijuro

OVA 1

(Subtitled)

He walked through the woods on the north side of the village where Akira said the bandits would enter the village. He made no noise and left no indications of his passing. He was merely a shadow and nothing more. His amber tinted eyes took in the area around him with a look that was devoid of all emotion, for emotions had no place in the middle of a battle such as this. His shadow blended in with the other shadows as he moved from tree, to bush, to rock with no indication whatever that someone was there. He was in search of his foes but only that. He would not attack them just yet. He only hoped to find them and gage their strength before returning to the outskirts of the village and to the open space he had chosen for this confrontation.

Kenshin had no intention of fighting all fifty men his unnamed opponent had. Rather, he wanted to call their leader out for a one on one duel, hoping to appeal to whatever sense of honor the man possessed.

"That is a foolish enterprise," the hitokiri muttered disagreeably.

Kenshin said nothing. Both the runouni and the hitokiri within himself were working together: the rurouni's fighting skills strengthened by the mindset of the hitokiri and the hitokiri's sword and rage tempered by the mercy and forgiving heart of the rurouni. Kenshin had struck a bargain with his darker self in this way. The hitokiri would be allowed to fight but his sword would henceforth be controlled by the rurouni to prevent the shedding of any more blood. The hitokiri had reluctantly agreed to the arrangement, sensing the rurouni's resolve to keep his vow no matter what happened. They would thus be able to exist together, two parts of the same whole and in this manner they could live in the new peaceful era. The rurouni would prevent the hitokiri from killing again for though his soul was that of a hitokiri, his heart was not.

A slight noise to his left alerted him to the fact that he was nearing the enemy's camp. Soon the telltale crackle of a fire and the heavy steps of perimeter guards reached his ears. He smiled a cold smile and walked on still undetected by his foes. He closed his eyes and shut out all other sounds around him. Soon he detected two more guards in the woods but only one that was near enough to be a threat. Kenshin moved on, nothing more than a shadow, until he spotted the guard who was pacing out steps back and forth in an even pattern, totally unaware that he was being watched. Up until a few months ago the guard would have already been dead, probably unaware that he had even been killed or by whom.

But now Kenshin waited a few moments to gage the man's movements and then he slipped passed the guard. He had walked for another few moments when he detected movement to his right. It was another guard, his back turned to Kenshin. This one seemed to sense that someone was watching him though because he turned around and stared hard at the shadowy space beneath a tree that Kenshin had jumped into when the later saw him. Kenshin remained still, hardly daring to draw breath, while the guard stared into the shadows around him. After a few moments of fruitless searching the guard shrugged, muttered something and continued on his rounds. 

"Why didn't I sense him?" Kenshin wondered as he moved on, his senses alert for more danger.

After what seemed like an hour but was probably, in reality, only a few moments he reached the edge of the camp. He saw about twenty men seated around a fire, grumbling and cursing.

"Damned swordsman!" one spate as he touched his bandaged side, his dark eyes smoldering with ill-concealed rage.

"I will kill him next time," another boasted as he swung a sword clumsily.

"Who does that young upstart think he is?"

Kenshin recognized these three as part of the group that had attacked the nuns and their charges.

"He is no concern of yours." A cold voice sliced through the air and all grumbling stopped. "This young swordsman will be mine. You just take care of 'business' in the village and I will deal with him."

The men laughed and exchanged leering glances, talking about the attributes of various women in the village. A shiver ran down Kenshin's spine at the sound of the voice. The Battousai recognized it but couldn't put a name or face to it. All he knew was that whoever the man was, he had known him in the past. He watched the shadows, searching for the owner of the voice but could see nothing. 

"He must be on the other side of the fire," Kenshin thought.

The hitokiri agreed with that assessment. They watched for a few moments until the order was given for the group they were watching to move out.

"That man, whoever he is, is dangerous," the hitokiri said quietly in his mind and Kenshin nodded in agreement as he made his way back to the village.

*

Kenshin reached the outskirts of the village several moments later, his senses on edge. He had nearly been discovered by one of the guards, who had almost bumped into him. He had not sensed this guard's presence and he now suspected that his enemy, whoever he was, had ninjas in his employ for they were the only type of fighters that could sneak up on him unaware and who could hide their presence from him. 

He waited calmly for the bandits to appear. When he had left, they were just beginning to move toward the village. Kenshin knew he was only a few minutes ahead of them but he had still arrived at the outskirts of the village first. He leaned against the trunk of a tree nearest the village, his eyes closed and his manner deceptively lazy, with his arms folded across his chest, listening for signs that the enemy was drawing near.

Finally, the sound of footfalls coming toward his position reached his ears. Still he remained as he was, slightly hidden by the shadows that always seemed to hover around him. The footfalls drew closer and Kenshin could hear the sound of muted grumbling and swords being drawn. He smiled inwardly and opened his eyes into slits, to better gage his opponent's arrival onto the field of battle. 

At last they came into view and Kenshin's eyes snapped closed again. He pushed himself from the tree and took a stand directly in the path the bandits were traveling on. He stood there, eyes closed and a hand held loosely over the hilt of his sakabatou. The wind whipped his red hair around him and the faint moonlight picked out the cross-shaped scar on his left cheek.

The bandits stopped dead in their tracks, their mouths slack and eyes wide and staring. Kenshin could feel the fear running through them and he smiled a cold smile. Clearly they had not been expecting the Hitokiri Battousai to be waiting to meet them.

"This will be the last night you terrorize the people of Yasuo Village." His voice was soft but it had a cold, hard edge to it. 

The men before him said nothing. They mutely stood there trembling with fear. Kenshin paused a moment and opened his eyes. They were glowing amber and narrowed in rage.

"The villagers desire only one thing…to live in peace," he said as he took a step forward.

The bandits backed away but did not make any move toward him. Battousai smiled at them, enjoying their fear and the power it gave him.

"This village and everything in it belongs to us by right of conquest," a cold voice to Kenshin's right said.

Kenshin turned and saw a shadow detach itself from the side of an abandoned house.

The man was taller than he was and was dressed from head to foot in unrevealing black. Kenshin could distinguish little else about the man except for his eyes, which burned with an icy coldness. He knew he had seen those eyes before but could not place them.

"Then I offer you a challenge." Battousai flicked his thumb and about a quarter inch of his blade became visible in an unmistakable challenge to his opponent. "If I win then control of this village will return to its rightful owners."

"And if you lose, Hitokiri Battousai, I will have your life but I will take it from you slowly." The cold voice laughed.

"I agree to those terms." Kenshin bowed and waited, his hand held loosely over his sword hilt in a lazy stance that often fooled his opponents.

The man came forward into the clearing and stood there, measuring Kenshin as his men made a ring around the combatants.

"I'm going to make you pay in blood for the deaths of so many innocents who were loyal to the Shogunate."

Kenshin stood impassive and unmoving, waiting for the man to make the first move, his eyes burning.

"Come then, take your revenge on me as I deserve but know this; there has not been a day that I haven't felt pain at the thought of those I have killed in cold blood and that I haven't wished my life could be given in exchange for theirs," he said in a flat tone.

The shadowy figure before him laughed and launched into his first attack, a Hirazuki aimed at Kenshin's chest.

"Is he Shinsengumi?" Kenshin had no time to wonder or even think as the two swords collided with a resounding ring that echoed through the town.

The two circled each other and traded blows but neither one was able to get through the other's defenses in order to hit. Battousai crouched in battoujutsu stance and glared at his opponent with narrow eyes, trying to anticipate his next move.

"You're as fine a swordsman as they claim, Battousai. It's a pity that you must die."

Battousai frowned at the man but refused to rise to his baiting and made no move to attack.

"If I die here then so be it but I will prevent you from harming another innocent person. I will take you down with me if you manage to kill me."

At that moment he charged the man, jumping into the air to avoid the man's defensive slash. He spun in midair and got in behind his opponent to hit him in the back with his sakabatou's dull side. The man staggered but did not fall from the blow and Battousai's eyes widened in surprise. No one had ever remained standing after that move.

"You think I have never seen your technique before, Battousai? Everyone knows of it if only in rumor and many have had the privilege to see it in action or to die on the blade of the one who wields it."

The man's cold voice broke through Kenshin's haze in time for him to see the sword coming at his unprotected side. Battousai moved out of the way of the strike and aimed another blow at the man's head. He blocked the blow and slashed at Battousai's face and the man's sword cut nothing but air. Battousai smiled a cold smile that was reflected in his bright amber eyes. The man charged again and Battousai sidestepped, watching him go sailing passed him.

"It's time to end this." Kenshin drew his sakabatou and the sword whistled, slicing the air as he spun on the balls of his feet, the target the back of the man's neck.

But the man was suddenly not where he had been and the blow never met flesh. The Battousai felt a flare of pain in his side. Unconsciously, his left hand went to the wound and it came away red from the blood that was staining his gi darker. His eyes widened in surprise and then he fell to the ground, his hand clutching at the wound as the pain of it washed through him and his eyes glaring up at the man as his blood dripped from the other man's katana.

"Not nearly good enough to beat me." The man stared down at him, hatred glowing in his eyes as he flicked the blood from his blade.

Battousai glared back at him as he rose slowly to his feet, testing the extent of the wound, trying to determine if it would interfere with his next attack. The wound was painful and muscle was damaged by the feel of it but he could continue the battle. He sheathed his sword again and smiled grimly at his opponent, his eyes burning with anger. He hated being wounded but he quickly compensated for the wound and was able to stand before his opponent with apparent ease.

"You should know better than to underestimate your opponents and overestimate your own abilities," he said in a conversational tone.

If the man was surprised at his ability to ignore the pain of his wound he gave no sign. Both Kenshin and the Battousai knew they would pay for it later. The man smiled and stood waiting for the next attack to come. Battousai narrowed his eyes and charged again. The two swordsmen fought on for several minutes, neither one holding anything back and neither one able to land a telling blow.

The sound of their swords clashing rang in the air and several of the villagers came out of their homes to see what was happening. Silently, they watched the two swordsmen involved in a dance of death. The villagers watched the battle, each with their own thoughts. They all saw the young swordsman they had shunned was defending them from their attackers and were awed by his compassion. They also felt ashamed at their treatment of him for the past few days. He was fighting for them even though they had not given him cause to want to help them. The villagers prayed within their hearts that the nameless swordsman would free them from the bandits grip but even more they prayed they would be granted a second chance to show him the respect that was due any person, even one who smelled of blood as he did.

*

The Battousai jumped back from a sword thrust aimed at his chest and watched his opponent warily. He blinked the sweat from his eyes and waited. His body was growing tired and his energy was waning, but he would not give up. The muscles in his arms and legs were screaming in pain and sweat coated the rest of his body, seeping into his many wounds, making them sting. He had a cut above his right eye, were he had gotten in to close to the man during a Hirazuki attack. There was a deep gash in his sword arm above the elbow where he had let his guard down in a vain attempt at a Ryu Sou Sen and another deep gash across his back where the man had gotten in behind him.

His opponent stood on the other side of the clearing, calmly flicking Kenshin's blood from his blade and putting it back in the guard position. The worst Kenshin had been able to do to him was a few broken ribs and some bruises. He had tried nearly every attack he possessed but, unlike his opponents in the past, this one refused to fall. He took the blows as if they were merely an annoyance. It was rapidly becoming apparent that if he didn't find a way to end this duel and soon, he would most likely die and the villagers would suffer for his decision to confront the bandit's leader. It was also becoming apparent that he had to make a choice: either he must hold to his no killing vow and possibly die for his beliefs or he must break his vow and have his soul die.

"Must I become the hitokiri again? I don't want to return to that life. There must be a way…"

There were still two attacks Kenshin hadn't tried against his opponent because he still wasn't sure of the speed required for one now that he carried a sakabatou and had hardly any strength or energy left for the second to be truly effective. The first was a multiple hit attack that he had yet to get a feel for using a sakabatou. The second was the modified Ryu Tsui Sen he had used before, which had seemed to have grown in power since he started using it with his new blade. It was almost as if this technique had been created for the sakabatou. It was his most powerful attack and the only one likely to bring his opponent down, provided that the man did not dodge the blow but did he have enough room for that attack this close to the forest edge and, more importantly, did his body have enough energy and strength left to jump the required height for the blow to have enough power behind it?

Battousai scanned the clearing and found there was just enough space for the move. The branches of the nearby trees were too far away to impede his flight and there was plenty of landing room.

"I'll have to be fast so he doesn't see what I am planning to do."

He rose from his crouched position and smiled at the man before charging straight at him so fast he was nearly invisible. At the last moment he leapt high into the air, higher then he had ever gone before. He hung there for a moment before hurtling back to earth with his sword at the ready.

The force of the impact jarred through his arms and he could hear bones breaking under the power of the blow. He felt the man crumple beneath him and heard a scream, just as he felt a searing pain in his shoulder and in his chest. He knelt on the ground, his hair hiding his face and his right hand gripping the hilt of his sakabatou, chest heaving. His left hand was wrapped around the hilt of a tanto that the man had used to stab upward as Kenshin descended. The force of that descent had driven the tanto up to the hilt into his chest. The world around him was becoming dark, then light, and then dark again as his eyes refused to work properly.

He tried to sit up but found himself following forward instead. He rolled over to avoid driving the tanto deeper into his body and screamed. A sudden pain flared in his shoulder as the dart in it was driven deeper into it. The shock of pain cleared his vision for a moment and he saw the man lying on the ground a few feet away from him. He was unconscious, his body sprawled out at an odd angle but Kenshin could see his chest rising and falling. 

His body suddenly began to grow cold and the vision before him became blurry around the edges. Too late he realized that the dart must have been coated in poison. The clearing became darker and he could hear shouts but only dimly. He smiled. He had saved the people of Yasou Village and had not had to break his oath to Tomoe to do it.

"They are safe and will live peaceful lives now," he thought with a detached part of his mind.

He brought his sakabatou up to his eyes and looked at his reflection in its shining surface. 

"Thank you Shakuu-dono for giving me a chance to prove my words to you were true and not just idealistic nonsense. I can only hope this sword finds a more worthy owner than I to wield it for its true purpose.

He closed his eyes and saw the serene and beautiful face of his wife, Tomoe, and smiled. 

"Tomoe…I…am…coming…" he whispered faintly as the world around him vanished into darkness.

*

The villagers gathered around him in a tight circle, not knowing quite what to do. Someone pushed through them until they reached the center where Kenshin lay. The woman knelt down beside his still form and rolled him over to take the dart out of his shoulder. She scanned the dart's length and found a trace of the poison. Her eyes widened when she looked at the color of the substance that covered the dart. She rolled him back over and pulled the tanto from his chest and noticed the same substance coating the blade.

"A double dose…" she thought and her heart skipped a beat. "Whoever this man is they wanted to be certain he died in most painful manner possible."

She lifted Kenshin up and he moaned loudly, already in the poison's deadly grip. His face was flushed and his body burned with fever. It would be a race against time to save his life. She rose and was surprised that he weighed no more than some of the children she cared for.

"Let me through. This man needs to be tended to quickly."

The crowd parted and let the nun through. She moved quickly though the town reaching the safety of the shrine in a few moments. She took Kenshin inside to a room usually reserved for the highest-ranking nun and gently laid on the futon. She called Shibohu and the others to aid her asking them to watch Kenshin while she got her supplies. As she went to retrieve her medicinal herbs, Takako wondered if she would be able to save the young man's life. She also wondered what members of the Shinsengumi were doing this far away from Kyoto. Could it be that they were still searching for her?


	6. Chapter Six

Kokoro No Itami Nakunaru Made Zutto
    
    Author: Hitokiri Gentatsu 
    
    Rating: PG
    
    Summary/Disclaimer: I do not own Rurouni Kenshin. He came from the pen of Nobuhito Watsuki and is owned by Shueisha 'Jump Comics', Fuji Television and others. 
    
    Chapter Six: Hidden from the Eyes of the World
    
    "I will lend my sword to your cause…but once the battle has been won…I will never kill again…never again."
    
    Himura Kenshin
    
    OVA 4
    
    (Subtitled)
    
    The ghosts of his past surrounded him and they all seemed to be stabbing every inch of his body with their already bloody katanas. They were after revenge for their deaths by his sword and there was nothing Kenshin could do to stop them. He screamed and tried to throw them off to no avail.
    
    "Please just kill me. It's no more than I deserve," he moaned.
    
    A quiet voice called out to him through the darkness and pain, speaking a name he had not heard in years, not since he was a small child.
    
    "Shinta…"
    
    "Mother?" Kenshin reached out to the sound of his mother's voice and felt someone's cool hands touch his face.
    
    He cried out as the ghosts began to stab him again. He tossed and turned trying to throw them off but he was too weak and they had him pinned down.
    
    "Just let me die," he whispered. "I'm too tired to fight anymore. I can't…"
    
    "Shinta listen please. You must live. You have to live…"
    
    "Sakura?"
    
    Kenshin began crying uncontrollably. He was badly hurt and it felt as if his body was on fire, the ghosts of his past continued to attack him and now voices from his past were haunting him. It was almost too much for his overwrought body and mind to take.
    
    "It's better I should die. I deserve it for all the pain I caused others. For all the death I brought…"
    
    He heard another voice, the soft, quiet and calm voice he knew so well.
    
    "Kenshin…"
    
    "Tomoe?"
    
    "What of your promise to me? Would you dishonor it and me? I did not give my life to save yours so that you could throw it away now nor did the others who died to protect you. You have to live. They still need you. Please live for me."
    
    "I will try…for you…"
    
    The voices and ghosts around him slowly faded until he finally fell into a true and deep sleep.
    
    *
    
    "Masahiro-chan, please fetch some more bandages and some fresh water."
    
    The child left the room without a word of argument or complaint to get the items Takako had requested. She kept an eye on the young man who seemed to be in a peaceful slumber now after weeks of thrashing around and crying out in delirium. 
    
    Takako took the damp cloth from his brow and checked his temperature again. It was slowly returning to normal and his face was not quite as flushed as it had been. Takako and the others had worked on clearing his system of the poison it had received for several days and now it finally looked like it had all been worth the effort. He had survived but only barely and he would be weak for some months to come. If she had waited even a minute more he would have found an early grave. He was lucky he seemed to possess some hidden inner strength that belied his seemingly fragile appearance and a will to live that far surpassed most people's.
    
    Shihobu entered the room bringing the afternoon meal with her.
    
    "He still hasn't wakened?"
    
    "No. His body is still healing itself from the poison but he is out of danger now and he will live."
    
    "You have done a remarkable job. It's almost a miracle…"
    
    "I did what anyone else would do." She never took her eyes from Kenshin's sleeping form.
    
    "You should rest. I can watch him for a while," Shihobu said quietly.
    
    Takako nodded and silently rose from Kenshin's side. She took the tray of food and walked to the open door and then turned to Shihobu. "He will need fresh bandages on his wounds and see if he will take some more of the medicine now."
    
    Shihobu nodded and Takako left with the food, pondering whether she should tell the others the secrets she held within her heart regarding herself and this seemingly innocent boy.
    
    "He is the Hitokiri Battousai." The thought did not frighten her or make her heart fill with rage like it once might have or like it had a few months ago when he had burst into that clearing to save them.

She had heard rumors when she lived in Kyoto, no one could not have lived in that war torn city without hearing people talk of an Ishinishi shadow that slew without mercy and in the darkness of the night. Even though her father worked for the Shogunate and was a member of the Shinsengumi, she couldn't help but admire the skill it took for this shadowy figure to do his job. She could also admire a man who stood up for what he believed in. Truth be told, her heart was with the Ishinishi. 

She always believed that she had caught a glimpse of the infamous hitokiri from a distance in an alley one night early in the fighting. He was shorter than she thought he would be but the figure's red hair marked him as the Hitokiri Battousai. Her father had always told her that if she ever saw him she was to report it immediately to him but she never did. He had only been walking and she was not absolutely certain it was him anyway. She merely liked to pretend it was.

In the end it was her sympathies for the rebel faction that got her into trouble with her father and later the Shinsengumi. She was known in the Ishinishi circles for taking in wounded members after their battles in the streets of Kyoto but her father never knew of it. She set up a safe house where she would treat their injuries and allow them to stay until the Shinsengumi began to seek other prey. (Ironically that prey was often the Hitokiri Battousai.) This safe house was not far from her father's yet, despite that, the Ishinishi knew they could trust her to take them in and not give them away. At the same time they never asked her for any information about Shinsengumi or Shogunate business knowing that she would never dishonor her father in that way. 

One night, not long after she had thought she saw the Hitokiri Battousai from a distance, she had an opportunity to see him again. Two Ishin samurai came into her safe house late with a third wounded man between them. She had them lay the man down and had begun to work on stopping the bleeding in his leg when the higher pitched voice of one of the men drew her attention. It was him again. The same man she had seen in the alley before. 

"So this is their prime hitokiri, the one everyone fears?"

She studied the man before and what she saw surprised her. He was a lot shorter then she had thought from her brief glimpse of him in the alley and he was also much younger, not even a man yet. His face was disfigured by a scar on his left cheek that rumor said was left by one of his many victims. She watched him for several moments more before returning to her work.

"Will he be all right?" said a quiet voice next to her several moments later.

Takako jumped and found the Battousai standing next to her.

"I didn't even hear or sense him there," she thought as her heart pounded in her chest. 

"If he rests for a few days, he will be fine," she replied calmly as if he hadn't frightened her in the least.

She looked into his eyes then and saw coldness but there was also something else in the violet gaze: sadness and loneliness. He smiled but that smile was devoid of any warmth and she saw his eyes change from violet to amber and then he was gone, leaving Takako to look at the spot he had been a moment before and the other man to mutter an apology and call after him to wait. A few days later her father was killed by the boy she had briefly seen a few nights before.

She had been grief stricken and had, from that moment on, closed her heart to all the suffering around her. She walked around the city of Kyoto hoping to take her revenge on the Hitokiri Battousai. She wandered for days, unable to find her father's killer. She was still dazed by her father's death and hadn't eaten for weeks when she finally found herself at the outer doors of a nunnery, where she began to slowly rebuild a life for herself. When she returned to the living world, she heard the Shinsengumi controlled the city and were in search of her because of her connection to the Ishinishi. She decided to remain hidden at the nunnery but she never forgot what had happened nor did she forget her vow to avenge her father's death. She spent years nursing her hatred for the man who had killed her father, letting it grow as time passed. Never letting it go

And now here he was again. The very man who had so heartlessly killed her father and left him to rot in the streets was here and under her power. She had the chance to avenge her father's death once and for all but now she found in her heart that she could not do this. The boy had changed. She had seen evidence of this in his eyes and deeds. He deeply regretted his actions. Pain and sorrow were still etched into his eyes but it seemed deeper than before. His smile held the warmth of life in it now and not the coldness of death.

Somewhere along the way he had stopped his headlong flight into darkness. Something or someone had taken the darkness from his heart and replaced it with light. He had not killed the bandit leader when he had the chance too and he had stood up to defend the villagers when no one else could. This was not the same man she had meet briefly a few years before. He was different and he was trying to atone for the evils he had committed. He deserved the chance to live. He deserved a chance to prove to himself and others that he was not an evil monster and that even the Hitokiri Battousai could be a peace loving and gentle man. Who was she to take his second chance at life from him? What gave her the right to take his life? She let him live and she prayed her father's spirit could forgive her.

*

He woke with a start, so suddenly that the woman who sat next to him jumped up in fright. He'd been dreaming again of the bloody terror of Kyoto. He panted with fear, his body trembling and his heart hammering in his chest. His eyes darted around the room taking in everything about it. Finally, his eyes came to rest on Takako, who was staring at him. 

"Gomen nasai, Takako-san. Please forgive me." He laid back down on the futon and stared at the ceiling, wondering how much time had passed.

"It's alright, Himura-san. You just startled me. How are you feeling? You've slept for near a month now." She looked down at him with concern.

Kenshin looked over at her confused. Takako's entire attitude around him had changed. She was being polite to him and there was concern mirrored in her eyes. She no longer seemed angry with him. He took stock of himself and found that, although the wounds ached, they were no longer as painful as they had been. He felt weak from a combination of the poison and being in bed so long but otherwise he felt better than he thought he would.

"I feel better. Weak but better," he said looking up at her.

"I am glad." She turned away from him and walked to a table. "I have brought you some food."

Kenshin found that he was starving and he sat up so that he could eat the soup she brought. Takako left him to eat alone but he didn't really mind. He wanted time to think about things. He felt strangely relieved to find that he was still alive and he found the food before him tasted better than any food ever had before. For the first time since Tomoe's death it felt good to be alive again. Was his heart finally beginning to heal at last? Was the darkness that had encompassed his soul for so long be lifting as it had once before? Would he find a place in this new era? 

*

For the next several weeks all Kenshin had the energy to do was rest. He was weaker than he thought he would be from the poison so any activity tired him greatly. This made him irritable and argumentative. Finally, the nuns gave him some chores to do to keep him active but without taxing his limited strength. This made him feel better because at least he wasn't forced to be cooped up in that small room that did not even have one window in it for hours at a time. Happily, Kenshin did the laundry and washed the vegetables, making it almost like a game for the children who came to watch. 

All the children were happy to see him back on his feet again and they followed him constantly, clearly afraid that he would leave them again. Kenshin sat for hours watching them play games and them tell him about things like the flock of birds that flew overhead or the fact that one of the older boys had been caught trying to kiss one of the girls. In return Kenshin told them stories that he remembered his mother telling him as a child and spent time making up new games for them to play. Life had returned to normal at the shrine and soon Kenshin had grown strong enough to be allowed to do whatever he wished. 

The first thing he did was play with the children. They romped through the woods together for hours, while playing the games he had invented for them. He showed the older ones what plants could be used for medicine and which ones were good to eat. He spent hours outdoors as if trying to make up for all the time he spent ill. His heart was as carefree as a child's and he was happy. He also made sure to continue his interrupted training with his sakabatou, growing more and more sure of how it would react to certain techniques and finally developing a new battoujutsu stance and technique that, in time, would be just as effective with the sakabatou, which was not designed for battoujutsu, as the old one had been with his other katana. 

He began also to notice changes in the village. Akira was restored to his rightful place as the village's lord and the people of the village were much happier and seemed to be prospering again now that the threat to their lives and property was gone. They treated Kenshin with more respect then he thought he deserved but he let them. He had saved their lives. The nuns were asked to stay at the shrine as there had been no one there for years and the villagers promised to repair it and supply them with all the food it needed to run and several of the children were taken into new homes. The run-down houses at the edge of town were repaired and stood waiting for new occupants to fill them. They had asked him to have the best one but he had politely declined, telling them that he was a wanderer and that he preferred the house be given to someone else, suspecting that there were a few of the older orphans who were ready to marry. 

He was happy that he had helped the village and the people but he was beginning to feel restless again. He had spent far too much time in this place and it was time for him to move on before he put them in any more danger. He had already said his farewells to the children after playing one last game with them. Now, he walked to the stream one last time to see the sunlight reflect off its surface and was surprised to find Takako and Akira there as well. He walked up to them and bowed. 

"So you came here before you left?" Akira 'looked' at Kenshin whose mouth was opened in surprise. 

"Yes, I must move on. I can't afford to stay in one place too long."

Akira nodded and Takako said softly. "Because you feel you are a threat to us being who you are."

Kenshin stared at her.

"I have known since you rescued us in that clearing and I have something to tell you." She told him the entire story of her life before becoming nun. "I thought I wanted revenge for the death of my father but then I noticed that you were not the same man you once were and I couldn't take your life. I hope you can forgive me for my lack of manners and for my desire to kill you."

"Takako-san, it is I who should be begging your forgiveness, though I know it is too much for one such as I to hope for. I regret the killing I did and am trying to atone for it. I am sorry for causing you pain." He bowed at her. 

"And I forgive you. Please come back this way again. You will always be welcome at the shrine." She smiled at him and left. 

"She will be fine now, Himura-san," Akira said. "Everyone will be fine now, thanks to you. You are welcome to return to Yasou Village anytime. If one day you find you are able to settle down then please return here."

Kenshin smiled and bowed. "Arigato, Akira-san. I will think about it on the road. But for now I think I must move on."

Akira nodded to him and smiled. Kenshin looked out across the river trying to gather his thoughts before moving on. 

"Well, I must return to my estate. Akira-chan will be looking for his 'grandfather' and I still have to train my new retainers." Akira rose from his place on the rock and smiled. 

Kenshin nodded. "Good luck to you then."

Akira bowed and left wishing him luck. It was time for him to move on but now he had a clearer understanding of his purpose. 

"Tomoe…I will continue to follow this path you have set me on. The path that I hope will lead me to peace."

He smiled and walked out of Yasou Village.

A famous Hitokiri lay aside his sword

Swearing an oath to kill no more

From the darkness of the night 

He thus returned to the light

Sought a path that lead to peace

There he at last found release

At Kyoto's gate he left his name

He disappeared leaving only his 'fame'


End file.
